On Wednesday, the Newspaper Association of America released its estimates for advertising revenue across the newspaper industry. The numbers for 2009 were nothing short of disastrous, once again bringing up a very tough question: Can newspapers find a way to survive?

Let's dive into the numbers.

A 44.24% Fall from Grace

In 2009, newspapers made $27.564 billion in total advertising revenue. As a whole, they generated $24.821 in print revenue, while the rest ($2.743 billion) came from online advertising.

Those numbers are indeed big, but when you put them in context, they are simply bad. In 2008, newspapers made $37.848 billion. Yes, they made a full $10 billion more last year than they did this year, a staggering drop of 27.2%. Nearly all of that loss was from print: Newspapers made $34.74 billion in print advertising in 2008, while they only accumulated $24.821 billion in 2009.

The story's even worse when you go farther back into newspaper advertising history. Let me outline just how far newspapers have fallen:

In 2000, newspapers peaked at $48.67 billion in revenue. This came entirely from print — the NAA did not track online ad revenue at that time, but we can assume it was a minuscule number.

In 2001, it started dropping. Revenues dropped from $48.67 billion to $44.305 billion, a 9% decrease year-over-year. This was during the time of the Dot Com Bust and the related recession, so this is no big surprise.

Around this time, the NAA also began tracking online ad revenue. At the peak in 2005, combined ad revenue reached $49.435 billion, with $2.027 billion of it coming from online sales

Then the floor completely caved in. In 2006, newspapers made $49.275 billion in total revenue. In 2007, it was $45.375 billion. In 2008, it dropped to $37.848 billion. In 2009, it plummeted all the way to $27.564 billion. In four years, newspaper ad revenue dropped by 44.24%. That's nearly half of the industry's revenue.

I have included the full spreadsheet at the end of this post.

Journalism Isn't Dead; It's Evolving

The numbers speak for themselves: The old newspaper model is simply not going to be market-viable as we head deeper in the digital age. News blogs (such as Mashable) and online reporting are the future of journalism.

As for young minds fresh out of journalism school — journalism is not dead, it is just evolving. Blogs and online publications are growing, providing a new and exciting medium for reporting on the day's news. Social media is already becoming integral to the new era of journalism, and is something journalists young and old should not ignore.

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